Building A Home

As I pulled up, I saw Garry out the front with a cable in his hands. Yes, the electrician was on duty. And Garry had good news - the power cable was fed down the conduit under the driveway with no problems at all! That's it on the lawn at the bottom of the photo. My neighbours have agreed to extend the easement for utilities to enable using their power pole - the item with the sign on it. Otherwise there would have been an additional pole, on the edge of the driveway, and just a few 100 mm from the existing pole. Which would have been silly! Having nice neighbours is wonderful.

The orange conduit is for power - it's also a larger diameter than the other conduits to handle the thicker cable. I am having 3 phase cabling run, in case it is needed later. It's relatively inexpensive to run now, and would be much more difficult to do once the job is finished. [The cable cost $2,000! - no wonder thieves are stealing copper cables!]

Looking west along the back fence, from the south east corner. The troublesome rock is in the foreground, and there is a lake building up in the far end from assorted drainage issues. The sewer trench is on the left of the rock - more or less delineated by the straight cut running parallel with the fence. Before I left, the digger was attacking the rock, as it is too high for the slab to be placed at the appropriate level.

A closer view of the lake appearing in the back diggings. The rock, ironstone, does not extend all the way along at the level it is on the eastern side. There was also a mystery pipe discovered running left to right across the cut. It's believed to be drainage from the house behind - one of the previous owners of the land.

Looking north west from the south east corner. Garry (left) and Craig, the electrician, are pushing the power cable through additional conduit as the power is being fed to the switchboard.

Digging away on the footings, for what will be the back of the garage. The rock here is a bit lower, and there was no trouble digging the footings. But it's probably not much lower.

The switchboard. This will be the one used for the house, which is why it's sitting on the scaffolding in an otherwise strange location - the house will be built around it.

Installing the ground stake - Garry holds the stake while Craig hits it with a hammer. Requires a certain amount of trust here! Actually this was think time, as the stake hit a rock - what a surprise! The stake is used to provide a good ground for the earth wire in the house.

The path of the newly placed conduit - the other end of the cable on the front lawn. Craig is doing something in the switchboard.

Cables And Footings